Fragments
by skeptic skeleton
Summary: They struggle to make amends with the broken binds of their family. The James-Jennings family are no longer full of love, but bitterness and hate. Even the angry suffer in their state./ Slight AU. One-Shot.


**Alright, so forever ago I promised this girl a DWAB story, but sadly, she never got it. When this idea came to me, I instantly remembered that she never got what she was promised, so this is dedicated to ausllyxoxo.**

**This is a really sad one-shot, and I have no idea where it came from. I really wanted to write some Avery/Tyler siblingness and yeah.**

**I suck at writing naive little kids, so I make no promises about Chloe.**

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it became a hopeless thing, painting. Doing so was like hoping itself, something Avery long ago gave up on.

When she held a paint brush and faced a blank surface, her mind instantly danced with happy images that had on e been the picture of her life-the life she still had. What good would it do to paint herself a picture that would never be here again?

Tyler didn't have such problems with his passion-music. It was something that he quickly picked up once the fighting began.

The fighting was different each night. Sometimes it started with Ellen loudly clanking the dishes as she put them in the dishwasher after dinner, and Bennett was critiquing something behind her. The yelling would follow Avery from her seat all the way to her bedroom.

Now, Avery laid in her bedroom, staring blankly up at the whiteness of her ceiling. The walls seem to rattle under the force of their angry words and screams.

She thanked the heavens that Chloe had chosen this weekend to go to her friend's house. An eight-year-old didn't need to hear this; it sounded like one of their worsened ones-the kind that could go on for hours, and usually did.

Her door opened quietly, the screams of her parents downstairs growing louder. she flinched, squeezing her eyes shut.

Avery's door fell closed with a small click. seconds later her bed dipped at the weight of her body.

"Hey," Tyler whispered. She could hardly make him out in the darkness of her bedroom. Avery hasn't been fond of light that much anymore; it's brightness only increased her gruesome headaches.

Avery pulled herself up. She felt sloppy-her clothes were wrinkled and her hair must have been a mess. Changing out of her school clothes hadn't crossed her mind.

"What are you doing here?" Avery asked her step-brother in a whisper.

Tyler threw an unreadable glance to her closed bedroom door, as if their parents would be able to feel its intense weight all the way in the living room.

"I don't want you here during this," was all he said before standing, seeming taller than usual.

Avery bit her lip, her fingers nervously messing with her tie.

Tyler and Avery had grown closer in the dark months of Bennett and Ellen's fighting. Her step-brother had seemed to finally step up as the oldest, always making sure that the impact of the screaming matches was softened somewhat for her sake. Playing music in his room for her; taking her and Stan to hang out in the park as late he could; sometimes just making sure she was wearing headphones or ear buds.

"What are we going?" Avery asked. She crawled off her bed and slipped into her gold shoes that sat at the foot of her bed from where she had kicked them off.

She caught Tyler's shoulders in the dark as he shrugged. "Somewhere that isn't here," he said.

They passed Stan as they quietly came out of her room. He laid next to her door, paws over his ears to block out the noise, making slight whimpering noises.

Avery smiled down sadly at him, leaning down to run her hand over his head.

"Don't worry, boy," she said softly, looking at her best friend with mourning eyes. She wanted to tack on something else, like it would be over soon, or this wouldn't last forever, but she learned long ago that lies only worsened the pain.

Stan hurried into her room as soon as he could-his tail thumped her door closed.

Avery caught sight of her parents over the stair railing. Ellen was sitting on the couch, her back to her, with her head in her hands. Bennett angrily paced in front of her.

She looked up when Tyler's hand fell onto the small of her back.

"Come on," he whispered so softly, the words evaporating into thin air as soon as fell from his lips.

Avery felt her stomach knot and palms clam up as Tyler silently led her into the kitchen to take the back door, grabbing the car keys from the counter. She felt bad for sneaking out when her mother was suffering, but she just had to get away.

Tyler drove smoothly on to the street; Avery watched the house disappear behind them, Maroon 5 playing loudly on the radio.

Avery wished desperately for the lyrics to stubbornly plant themselves in her head—although her old self would have loathed such a distraction—but she needed something to block out the screams.

But they remained, echoing off the walls of her mind the entire drive.

_"I can't stand this anymore!"_

_"Nothing's keep you here! Why don't you just leave?!"_

_"You don't even want to try!"_

Avery wasn't shaken from her thoughts until she felt the car slow to a gentle stop.

She looked up from her shoes. They were at Charlie's, the best ice cream shop in Pasadena. Avery smiled as she caught sight of the bright blue sign and the black and white checkered floors through the glass windows.

She hadn't been here since before the fighting began.

Tyler held the door for her, letting her enter first. Avery felt the chill draft settle around her pleasantly, the smell of syrups and sweets filling her nose.

"What are you getting?" Tyler asked casually. His hands were buried deep in his pockets as he stepped up to the counter full of several ice cream flavors.

Avery craned her neck to take in the menu. It was a chalkboard, all of Charlie's treats categorized in neat, pretty handwriting.

A small teenager with cherry-red hair and inked wrists greeted them with a perky smile when they stepped up to the counter Tyler's question still hanging by the ice creams, unanswered.

Minutes later Tyler and Avery sat in a back booth, the soft red leather of the seat comfy under Avery's body as she leaned back, tucking her knees into her chest.

Idly she picked at her turtle sundae, the caramel and vanilla ice cream cold and creamy on her tongue.

Across the table she eyed Tyler's cherry, sitting on his hot fudge masterpiece untouched. She vaguely recalled him admitting to never liking the cherries that much, unlike Avery, who often thought them the best part of a sundae.

Tyler, soon catching Avery's hungry stare, and laughed, scooping the cherry up with his scoop and putting on her turtle.

She offered a tiny smile. "Thanks."

It wasn't an attempt to fix the wound, and it didn't fix their parents, but the cherry was enough for Avery to forget that her home could hardly be a home anymore.

Not to them.

**:/:**

They spent around two hours hanging out at the ice cream shop. Tyler couldn't care less, but he asked Avery about school, one of her favorite topics.

His step-sister brightened considerably, and began rattling on about how Lindsay was in a crisis because her mom's new cat had eaten the brim of one of her hats.

She asked him what it was like having short hair, something his did purely to see if their notice. Three months have gone by without a word of it.

But sometimes he laid awake at night—the nights where he would have to get up for school in a few hours—and think maybe they did notice, and it was another thing to fuel their fighting. He hadn't asked neither of them after all, and maybe they both hated it and decided to take it out on each other.

Just like they always did.

Tyler heard them at night too, Ellen screaming that Bennett's unprofessional ways were the reasons Chloe was so stuck in the clouds; Bennett screaming back that her uptight nature was why Avery took the world so seriously and barely had fun in life.

Sometimes he just wanted to go down there and scream at both of them. Their fighting was the reason Chloe was always stuck in her imagination; their screaming in the night was what kept Avery from having any fun.

Now, he pulled to a stop and cut the engine in the driveway, staring at the front door in disdain. He didn't want to drag himself in there; he didn't want to drag Avery through there, who was currently balled up in the passenger seat, sleeping with her head leaning against the seat belt that strapped her in place.

He sighed, undoing their seat belts and opening his door. Tyler spent a moment staring Avery from the opened passenger seat door, looking from her to the door several times. The lights were still on, which could mean anything, and Tyler really didn't have the heart to wake her up.

Sighing, he carefully lifted her into her arms, shutting the door with his foot and fumbling for a minute or two before managing to click the car locked.

Just as Tyler quietly snuck through the back door, there a furious door slam coming from the living room. It was probably the door to his dad's office, rattling the house the way it sometimes did.

Avery stirred in his arms, legs dangling over his arms as he cradled her like a baby.

It wouldn't take much to sneak them past the couch, where his mom was probably lying on the couch, suffering through the ending of their fights as she usually did by herself.

Tyler took a deep breath, carefully knocking his way through the kitchen door.

Like expected, Ellen was on the couch, making no signs of moving as Tyler carefully carried his sister up the stairs.

When he reached her room, Tyler made sure to mind Stan's curled up position on the foot of her bed as he laid her down. He pried off her shoes and undid her tie to drape on the back of her desk chair, quietly taking his leave, shutting the door behind him without a sound.

An odd feeling built up in the pit of stomach as Tyler retreated to his own room, ripping off his shirt and belt before falling back onto his bed, eyes closed.

He hadn't put his sister to bed since it was his job when Chloe was ages three through five. There mother had just passed when Bennett had put him to work with taking care of Chloe, and he was still full of bitter feelings over her death.

Bitter feelings had resurfaced, except in a different situation, and an unclear ending.

Tyler rolled on to his side, blinking into the inky blackness of his bedroom. What would happen to him when his parents split? Would happen to Chloe and Avery?

They had been doing pretty well with the fighting, but divorce was a subject that had steadily diluted themselves of thinking about, even though it clung around the house hold with every scream and scorned look passed between their parents.

Stuck in this state of mind made Tyler realized he would miss Avery being around. Her uptight attitude, the way her room always smelled like paint, and her, admittedly, her teacher-like ways.

He wouldn't be able to handle it if she left, because they were brother and sister now, even with there parents fighting.

If Ellen left, Avery would follow. Chloe would break at too young an age, and he would fall apart once again.

But maybe that was the real question, when you stripped everything away.

What would be better for them to stay, or to go?

Tyler slept restlessly that night.

**:/:**

Months past before the day came. Chloe and Stan were currently the only two in the kitchen, the small redhead reaching up on her tip toes on a step stool trying in vain to have her fingers meet contact with her favorite cereal box.

"Stan?" she asked her friend through a concentrated grunt, "don't you think monkey arms would come in handy a lot more at this age instead of thirty?"

Stan lifted his head from his paws, opening his mouth to respond, when an angry shout came from the direction of the living room. "No! You're not taking my sister away!"

Chloe and Stan shared a curious look. It was often that Chloe ever heard Tyler yell, especially when Mommy and Daddy always did enough of it for everyone. But if it was enough to get Tyler upset, it must be serious.

The pair rushed in to the room, Chloe's frizzy red mop flopping stubbornly into her eyes as she nearly bumped into the arm of the couch.

Avery stood next to Tyler, tears threatening to spill as he hugged her close with one side.

Ellen and Bennett stood together, the tension obvious between them, but Stan thought that, for once in several long, dreadful months, they kind of looked like a unit again. Except, scarier.

"We understand you two have grown close, but this is what's best for everyone," Ellen tried to calmly state, soothing out all the wrinkles like she was folding a shirt.

"Tearing us apart is the best thing for us?" Tyler gave a humorless bark of laughter. "Please, we aren't stupid. We all know that the only problem is you too."

There was a tense silence as Tyler exchanged glares with the people that had once been his parents.

Avery broke free of her brother's protective grip to run over her sister and wrap her arms around her tiny shoulders that had begun to noticeably shake. Chloe turned and buried her head in her sister's stomach, small tracks of tears running down her pale cheeks.

"Can't you see what you're doing to them?" Tyler demanded sharply, gesturing to his huddled sisters with a cold look etched across his features. "What's tearing them apart going to do? Chloe looks up Avery; so do I, more than I would like to admit. I won't let you take my sister away from me!"

Ellen sucked in a breath, sparing a glance over at her daughter she soothed the younger girl's wild man down at with her slim hands. The woman knew that her fighting with her husband had formed a worrisome bond between the kids, and through that, a protective instinct. But staying together, even for their sakes, was not the answer. She just couldn't do it.

"I'm sorry you feel that way, but this is the way it has to be," Ellen said firmly, standing her ground.

Avery sucked in a breath at her mother's words. She saw this coming—they all did. But that didn't make the hurt any less painful. She straightened, giving Chloe's hair one less helpless pat, that knelt down to Stan's height.

"I love you, boy," she cooed affectionately, stroking the spot behind his ears, "I'll miss you."

He gave a whimper to reply, looking up at her with dark, sad eyes.

Avery swallowed the growing lump in her throat and stood on shaky knees.

Tyler pulled her into a hug as she past.

Avery finally decided she could let out a a strangled sob when she caught a heavy whiff of his always-present cologne. She buried her face in his shirt and gripped him close by the waist. Tyler held her close by her shoulders.

"We'll be fine, okay?" He assured her quietly once they finally pulled away.

Avery reached up to hurried wipe at her eyes with shaking fists, nodding back and forth quickly. "Of course," she agreed with a tight smile. "We'll be fine."

After having Ellen curtly announce that they would be dropping in and out throughout the week to pick up their things, Avery reluctantly vanished with her mother through the doorway.

What would happen to her room? To all the paintings that reminded the household of her existence? Would Bennett paint over them and erase her presence without a second though? Or would they remain, a permanent reminder of what had been?

Her mind raced with these thoughts as she stumbled into the passenger seat of her mother's car. She choked on sobs and let her vision blur with tears as they pulled out of the driveway, leaving the house behind them much as Avery and Tyler had done the night of Charlie's.

* * *

**This could possibly be a two-shot if any reveiwers say they want a second chapter.**

**It's kind of a relief to get this done and over with, two week's work, or somewhere around there. But I did love writing Tyler and Avery's sibling bond. And I don't think I did a bad job on Chloe either, giving what she was going through and what situation.**

**Please review and tell me what you thought, and if you would possibly want to see a second chapter.**


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